Acquired and Inherited Traits - Difference & Meaning

Acquired Traits

A trait that creates a phenotype that is affected by various environmental factors is known as an acquired trait. Acquired characteristics are not encoded in the DNA, so many scientists thought that they could not be transferred to the next generation during reproduction. A trait must be a part of any particular genotype to be handed down to the next generation. It means an acquired trait is built into the DNA of that person.

The non-heritable modifications in the function and shape of the living organisms are the things that occur after birth, such as any disease, abuse, accident, cut and other environmental effects. Acquired characteristics and acquired traits are both similar types of things. They are not passed through generations. Acquired characteristics can take a number of forms and have various degrees of visibility.

An example of an acquired trait is the muscles of a bodybuilder that one gains by doing hard physical exercises and a strict diet.

Examples of Acquired Traits

Muscle Building: The growing of muscles that results from performing regular weight training is an acquired trait.
Language Proficiency: The knowledge of multiple languages, which is acquired through learning and practice, is an acquired trait.
Tanned Skin: Getting dark-skinned due to multiple exposures to the sun is an acquired trait.

Lamarck, Darwin and Acquired Traits

The great scientist Jean-Baptiste Lamarck was at fault for thinking that acquired traits may be transferred from the parents to their children and that their offspring become more favourable to their environment. This was known as Lamarckism. This theory was published in the first publication of the Theory of Evolution by Natural Selection by Charles Darwin. However, this was removed after some objections that acquired characteristics do not transfer from generation to generation.

The offspring of bodybuilders with more and stronger muscles could be an example of an acquired trait. Lamarck thought that the offspring would be born with similar size and shape of muscles of their parents. But in reality, the larger muscles were not transferred to the children because it was an acquired characteristic, which is a result of hard physical training and proper protein intake.

Inherited Traits

These traits or characteristics are transferred from parents to their young ones. Humans have inherited features such as the colour of hair, eye colour, skin tone, shape of body, and height. The particular hereditary features are defined by their genes. In a single human cell, there are about 25,000 to 35,000 genes. All the characteristics that a child gets from their parents are encoded in genes.

Sir Gregor John Mendel popularised the concept of hereditary characters with the help of his pea experiment. He explained dominant characteristics as those that are visible in the offspring, whereas recessive traits are those that are not visible in them.

Sir Gregor John Mendel used the following inheritance laws to explain the hereditary traits:

Law of Dominance

The law of dominance states that when two opposite types of character are present in a single individual, only one dominates in the F1 progeny and is referred to as the dominant trait. The recessive trait is the opposite of the dominant trait.

Law of Segregation

The law of segregation states that during the formation of gametes, two copies of every hereditary character segregate so that offspring or the F2 generation get one character from each parent or the F1 generation.

Law of Independent Assortment

The law of independent assortment states that when two pairs of traits are combined again, the segregation of one pair of traits during gamete production is independent of the other's character pairs.

In a current study, we found that Lamarck was not fully wrong, because according to the researchers of Columbia University Medical Centre, the roundworms have the quality of resistance from a special virus, so they handed that protection down to their offspring for the next generations.

Examples of Inherited Traits

Blood Group: Inherited blood type could either be A, B, AB, or O.
Eye Colour: The genes from parents give a person their eye colour.
Ear Shape: Ear shape is another aspect of the body that is inherited.

Difference between Acquired Traits and Inherited Traits

Acquired traits refer to the characteristics that a person acquires during their life. Inherited traits refer to the characteristics that a person is born with. The main differences between acquired traits and inherited traits are as follows:

Why are Acquired Traits not Inherited?

Acquired traits are not transferred as they do not affect the DNA of the organism, and thus are referred to as the genetic code. These are thus encoded into the DNA of an organism and then passed down to progeny through various reproductive processes.

Lamarck proposed that acquired traits are heritable, yet there is no evidence supporting this theory except for scientific proof that such is impossible. The experiments done by Mendel and the discovery of DNA structure by Watson and Crick proved that the features encoded within genes are the ones inherited.

Example: Muscles gained through exercise are an acquired trait and thus will not be passed to their offspring since it does not alter the genetic material.

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Also Read:

• Molecular Basis of Inheritance

• Complementary Genes

• Chromosomal Abnormalities